(Newser)
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Barack Obama is closing out the campaign fighting for Republican ground, the New York Times reports, with the Democrat aiming to seal the deal by giving still-unsold voters a final chance to size him up. His final message will hit broader, less partisan themes, and his strategy is forcing John McCain’s beleaguered campaign to defend once deep-red states such as North Carolina and Indiana.

Facing a deluge of negative press and already plagued by campaign and party infighting, McCain and Sarah Palin are hammering Obama as a tax-and-spend liberal as they fight for states like Iowa and Pennsylvania, which Democrats believe are nearly locked up. As former House Speaker Newt Gingrich put it, “Any serious Republican has to ask, ‘How did we get into this mess?’”